Tavistock Ladies 1st XI 8 Newton Abbot 1 TAVISTOCK Ladies 1st XI Hockey team had their first match of the new season against Newton Abbot. With temperatures soaring, the team knew that it had to be a good passing game if every player was to survive the heat. The game opened with Tavistock on the attack allowing Sarah Barratt and Robynne Honey to have some good runs up the pitch. Judy Miller was sat waiting in the ?D? but the goalkeeper was strong and defended the first few attempts at goal extremely well. The first goal came from Newton Abbot despite the ball being struck outside the ?D?. Tavistock picked up the pace of the game and with Laura Stapleton and Fiona Dunn being as strong as ever in their tackling and ball skills the ball was released to the running play of Jo Gaspar and Laura Armstrong. Barratt scored Tavistock?s first goal from a good rebound shot. It was not long after that Gaspar was goal hungry in the ?D? and the second goal followed from a hefty strike past the keeper. Zoe Viggers and Sandra Collar worked hard through midfield and both these players made some good block tackles. The odd time that the opposition did look as if they were going to attack the ?D? goalkeeper, Bex Creasy, alerted team members to this and they were marked up swiftly and strongly by Babs Horton, Viggers and Stapleton. Laura Armstrong had a good game and after taking the ball past numerous players she scored Tavistock?s third goal. The score at half-time was 3-1. Honey had an excellent game and fed some good balls into the ?D?. It was not long before Judy Miller got on the end of one of these and scored the fourth goal. The opposition?s goalkeeper was playing well and so Tavistock really had to work hard to secure the goals. The midfield of Tavistock did appear to be unpenetrable as Stapleton, Dunn and Barratt took the ball easily from players. Gaspar scored her second goal of the match taking it to 5-1. At times the passing of Tavistock was sloppy and Newton Abbot then took the ball but Butler and Viggers backtracked well and prevented any attack. Armstrong was working well with Collar and Gaspar thus allowing her to score yet again. A good run up the pitch from Honey saw her take the ball into the ?D? and put the shot away. Armstrong was not far behind in scoring the final goal of the match. Player of The Match: Sarah Barratt.
